Thursday, 4 October 2012

Turkish Airlines has announced its adding three extra return flights per week on Mondays, Fridays and Saturdays evenings from the beginning of next year’s summer season, when it will operate 10 return flights per week on the Dublin-Istanbul route. Last year 80,000 passengers used the route (Flightglobal 2nd October).

Dublin Airport Authority Head of Aviation Business Development Cormac O’Connell said "We have been working closely with Turkish Airlines for several years and this extra frequency will offer passengers additional choice and convenience.”

Turkish Airlines Ireland Managing Director Murat Balandi said “We are delighted to announce this increase in flights out of Dublin. This will provide more options for our customers and also opens up extra options for connecting flights out of Istanbul and will mean more traffic through Dublin Airport. We are constantly looking for more ways to assist our customers and hope that this will be of great benefit to them.”

Ryanair announced it is to add an extra flight on the Dublin-Brussels Charleroi route from 7th November, prior to Ireland assuming the six-month Presidency of the Council of the EU on 1st January 2013. The extra daily flight enables the same day return on the route during the business week (Monday to Friday).

Ryanair Head of Communications Stephen McNamara said "“Irish and European politicians can save Europe’s taxpayers thousands of euro by switching to Ryanair’s low cost flights without having to fork out on hotels or other expenses, thanks to our double daily flights".

The flight is now open and available for booking until Friday 29th March 2013 operated by a Dublin based aircraft.

Aer Lingus announced it carried 1.019 million passengers in September up 1.7%, the airline carried 97,000 long-haul passengers up 4.3% with a load factor of 90.7% up 3% on a 0.4% increase in capacity, and it carried 829,000 short-haul passengers down 1.4% with a load factor of 81.4% up 0.5% on a 0.9% decrease in capacity.

Aer Lingus Regional carried 93,000 passengers up 36.8% and year to date has carried 752,000 passengers. As usual figures exclude traffic on the United Airlines Joint-Venture Washington Dulles to Madrid route.

Compared to the Association of European Airlines (mainly so-called legacy carriers) as whole, the Aer Lingus passenger load factor was higher on short-haul routes (81.4% v 78.7%) and on North Atlantic routes (90.7% v. 87.9%). AEA short-haul traffic (RPK) was up 6.0% and North Atlantic up 3.3%.

Ryanair announced it carried 7.84 million passengers in September up 8% with a load factor of 84% down 1% and year to date has carried 79.07 million passengers.